Analysis & Opinion

After weeks of intense speculation and sabre-rattling, Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the United States House of Representatives, is reportedly set to visit the self-ruled island of Taiwan. The top US legislator did not put Taiwan in her official Asia tour itinerary, which kickstarted with visits to Singapore and Malaysia.

Europe is sweltering during a prolonged summer heatwave. But the attention of political leaders is increasingly focused on the coming winter. As a succession of recent warnings from the International Energy Agency (IEA) and elsewhere has underlined, an energy crisis to rival the oil price shock in the 1970s could hit when the weather turns cold.

China has accused the United States of being “the biggest threat to world peace, stability and development”, in response to accusations by the heads of security services in Washington and London that Chinese spying is a global threat and China is threatening international order.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has told MPs he would “keep going” despite a growing list of Conservative ministers and other officials resigning in protest over his handling of the case of a senior official accused of sexual misconduct.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has arrived in Hong Kong to mark 25 years since the former British colony returned to Beijing's rule.

To avoid ‘youth-washing’ politicians and corporations, young people now are more likely to coalesce around radical policies or campaigns

The sun is rising on a new day for Colombians, especially for those who Vice President-elect Francia Marquez calls the “nobodies”: women, Indigenous communities, Afro-Colombians, LGBTQ+, working class, disabled people and all the others who have been disproportionately impacted by poverty, state violence, discrimination and environmental destruction in the country.

French President Emmanuel Macron addressed the nation for the first time on Wednesday since his centrist coalition lost control of parliament in Sunday elections. "We must learn to govern and legislate differently," Macron acknowledged in his first public comments following the election setback.

Faced with the threat of a hung parliament, French President Emmanuel Macron’s ruling coalition has shifted its fire from the far right to a new left-wing bloc after a first round of parliamentary elections that exposed the inadequacy of its campaign and the narrowness of its support base.

In 2017, Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s La France Insoumise (Unsubmissive France) sat alongside Spain’s Podemos, Greece’s Syriza, the Bernie Sanders campaign in the US and Labour under Jeremy Corbyn as part of a worldwide “left populist wave” that combined charismatic leadership with radical policies.